Human Acts(20)
—
“Why give his contact details to some assistant editor he’s never met before, when even his own family don’t know how to get in touch with him?”
Blinking rapidly, she managed to say that she doesn’t know, she honestly doesn’t know.
He slammed his fist down on the table and she recoiled, her hand automatically flinching up to her cheek, as though she’d been hit again. And only then, upon lowering her hand, did she stare in surprise at her bloodied palm.
—
How am I going to forget? she wonders, in the darkness.
How can I forget that first slap?
The eyes of the man, who had examined her in silence at first, calm and composed like someone about to carry out an entirely practical item of business.
Herself, who, when he’d raised his hand, had sat there thinking, surely he’s not going to hit me.
The first blow, that had seemed to jolt her neck out of alignment.
Slap Two
The publisher’s niece, a lively, cheerful young woman who frequently ran errands for them, dropped by the office just before lunch.
“Ah, there you are!” Her uncle greeted her warmly, but darted a hurried glance over at Eun-sook when the latter looked up from the papers she’d been examining.
“Have the bound proofs arrived yet?” Eun-sook asked, smiling stiffly. Unable to tear her gaze from the older woman’s face, the publisher’s niece fumbled with her briefcase, eventually tugging out a proof.
“What happened to your face?” When this met with no response, the young woman cornered Yoon, who dealt with production, and asked again. “What happened to Eun-sook’s face?” Yoon merely shook his head; the young woman’s eyes widened, and she turned back to the publisher.
“Well,” he said, “I told Eun-sook she should go home early today, but what can I say, she’s a stubborn one…”
He tapped a cigarette out of his pack, stuck it between his lips and lit up. Opening the window behind his chair, he stuck his head through the gap and took such a deep drag on the cigarette that his cheeks caved right in, then finally blew out the smoke. He was middle-aged, the sort of man whom even the smartest clothes couldn’t prevent from looking permanently wrung-out. A man who used humble, honorific language even to those who were young enough to be his children. A man who, despite being the head of this tiny publishing house, hated the title “Boss” and wouldn’t allow anyone to address him as anything other than “Publisher” to his face. The high-school classmate of the translator whose whereabouts the police detective had demanded from her.
The owner’s niece left once she’d finished talking with Eun-sook, leaving the mood in the office somewhat deflated. The boss stubbed out his cigarette.
“Do you fancy some barbecue for lunch, Miss Kim? My treat. Beef skirt from that place up by the junction.”
This sudden show of sociability chimed oddly with Eun-sook. It hadn’t occurred to her to wonder before, but now she began to doubt. The boss had also stopped in at Seodaemun police station, early yesterday afternoon—not that long before she had. How had he persuaded them to leave him alone?
“Thank you for the offer, but I’m fine with getting something myself.” Her answer might have seemed a little frosty, but she couldn’t really help that given that her swollen face hurt too much for her to smile. “You know I don’t like meat.”
“Ah yes, that’s right, you’re not a meat fan.” The boss nodded to himself.
It wasn’t so much eating meat that Eun-sook disliked; what really turned her stomach was watching it cook on the hot plate. When the blood and juices rose to the surface, she had to look away. When a fish was being griddled with the head still attached. That moment when moisture formed on the frozen eyeballs as they thawed in the pan, when a watery fluid flecked with gray scum dribbled out of its gaping mouth, that moment when it always seemed to her as though the dead fish was trying to say something. She always had to avert her eyes.
“So then, what shall it be? What would you like to eat, Miss Kim?”
Yoon chose that moment to pipe up.
“You’ll bend our ears for us if we go somewhere expensive and run up a huge bill. Let’s go to that café we went to last time.”
With Yoon making three the office would be empty, so they locked the door behind them before walking up to the café by the junction. It was next door to the barbecue place the boss had originally suggested—a fairly ramshackle place, where home-style boiled rice was dished up by a proprietor whose summer flip-flops exposed a toenail black with rot, then in winter she shuffled around with grubby socks stuffed into tatty old snow boots.
As they were finishing their meal, the boss turned to Eun-sook.
“Shall I stop by the censor’s office tomorrow?”
“That’s always been my job…”
“Well, there was a lot of hassle yesterday; I’m just sorry you had to be involved in that.”
She looked across at him, pondering his words. How had he contrived to come out of there unharmed? By sticking only to what were, strictly speaking, the facts? Kim Eun-sook is the editor in charge. The two of them met at the bakery by Cheonggye stream and went through the manuscript proofs. That’s all I know. He’d stuck to the facts, nothing wrong with that; but was that bitter thing called conscience quietly needling away inside him?